Two weeks ago, Tuğçe Albayrak, a 23-year-old teaching student, came to the aid of two young teenagers being harassed by three men in a McDonald’s bathroom in Offenbach, Germany. Albayrak confronted the men and they were thrown out of the restaurant. When she left the restaurant, however, the men attacked her with a heavy, blunt object, like a baseball bat or a rock. After two weeks in a coma from which she has no hope of recovering, her parents have taken her off of life support.

People rally in Berlin to remember Tuğçe Albayrak, who died after being beaten in an apparent revenge attack. Photograph: Maurizio Gambarini/dpa/Corbis

Every human life is precious. Every life lost simply out of anger or intolerance is a scar on the face of humanity, a face which already has so many scars. So today, look around you. Look at the people you love, look at the people you like, look at the people you see outside your car window and remember that everyone is precious.
Remember all of the people, like Tuğçe Albayrak who have died at the hands of misogynistic men. Remember all of the people who, like Michael Brown, have died at the hands of racist people or cops or racist cops. Remember all of the people who have died to save another person’s life. Remember all of the young people who have died when their lives were just beginning, remember all of the people who have died because of the color of their skin or their religion or their nationality or their gender or sexuality. Remember all of these people and remember that even if you didn’t know them, their lives mattered.